This invention relates to component handling equipment, and more especially to mechanism for verifying component conformity to predetermined sequence. The invention is particularly adapted for relatively advancing successive elongated articles (for instance, coaxial lead type components) from a continuously operative conveyor to pass them through a processing or test station, and if qualified, to return them to the conveyor in unchanged order.
As disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,669,309 and 3,971,193, for instance, large numbers of lead-bearing electronic components are predeterminedly sequenced by automatically controlled means for use in industry. In some cases the components may, when they have been arranged side by side in selected predetermined order, simply be interconnected by means of tapes for holding the components spaced for eventual sequential mounting in circuitry, and in other situations it may be that the components, when rearranged in required order (usually in repeating, similarly-sequenced groups), will be fed seriatim for further direct processing, for example, insertion in printed circuit boards. In-line sequencers in current commercial use may have a productive capacity in excess of 18,000 components per hour.
Component manufacturers have long provided equipment for testing their products (i.e. inspection for presence and specific electrical characteristics) prior to shipment to assembler's plants. The possibility of defects and damage arising during storage, in transit, or in subsequent handling dictates that precaution must be taken to avoid any occasional unsatisfactory electronic component finding its way into a circuit assembly so that the latter will not also prove faulty. It has additionally been known as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,236,374, for example, to provide, in combination with an intermittently operable conveyorized machine for sequencing axial lead type components, a component testing device adapted to function each time the conveyor stopped for this purpose. The necessity to frequently stop and start such apparatus incurs a decrease in output which cumulatively may be considerable and therefore undesirable.
Additional prior art disclosures are noted in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,896,314, 3,073,446; 3,240,336; and 3,366,235.